Pope discusses Ukraine with Russia's Metropolitan
Hilarion
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| Pope Francis meets with Russian Orthodox Metropolitan Hilarion in the Vatican on Tuesday.- AP |
(Vatican
Radio) Pope Francis met on Tuesday with Russian Orthodox Metropolitan Hilarion,
who came to thank the Holy Father for the recent loan of the relics
of the 4th century Saint Nicholas of Myra.
The relics, which were taken from the southern Italian city
of Bari to Moscow and St Petersburg, drew huge crowds of Orthodox
pilgrims during the two month loan period.
Metropolitan Hilarion, who has been a regular visitor to the
Vatican in recent years, heads the department for external church
relations.
Speaking to Vatican Radio after the private audience, the
Orthodox leader said he and the pope also discussed ongoing tensions in
Ukraine, as well as joint efforts to support Christians in the
Middle East. Despite a warming of relations between Moscow and Rome, he
said there are no current plans for a papal visit to Russia, or for Patriarch
Kirill to visit the Vatican.
Metropolitan Hilarion says the “translation of the relics of
St Nicholas to Russia was a very special event” as almost 2.5 million people
came to venerate them, standing in queues of up to ten hours.
Relics of St Nicholas
He notes that for many decades, relations between Catholics
and Orthodox developed out of sight of ordinary people in Russia. The first
event which came to their attentions, he says, was the historic meeting
of Pope Francis and Patriarch Kirill in February last year, but the first event
in which people participated was the veneration of the relics.
Joint efforts to support Christians in Syria
Asked about other joint projects, the Orthodox leader says
his Church has created a working group with Catholics to provide humanitarian
assistance to Christians in the Middle East, in particular to catalogue the
churches, monasteries and shrines that have been destroyed during the war in
Syria. While he says he hopes the war will end soon, he adds there will be an
immense task of restoring the country and the churches, as well as providing
safe spaces for Christians to go back home.
Religious freedom in Russia
Speaking about religious freedom in Russia, Metropolitan
Hilarion says the concerns of some journalists “in my view, are ungrounded”. He
says that Jehovah’s Witnesses have been prohibited from activities recently,
since they are considered “not as a Christian Church, but as a sect”.
Tensions in Ukraine
He says that he discussed with Pope Francis the situation in
Ukraine, “where, in our point of view, violations of religious freedom are
quite visible and quite open”. He mentions especially laws proposed by the
Ukrainian parliament to “discriminate” against the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of
the Moscow Patriarchate, which is accused of being an agent of Russia and
treated as a foreign religious organisation.
Abstain from aggressive rhetoric
Despite the desire for reconciliation expressed by the pope
and the patriarch in their joint declaration, Metropolitan Hilarion says it’s
hard to speak of progress in relations between Orthodox and Greek Catholics in
Ukraine. He adds that the first step must be for each religious confession “to
abstain from aggressive rhetoric”.
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